A formalism for causal explanations with an Answer Set Programming translation

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates how recent advances in Answer Set Programming (ASP) enable practical and efficient formal representations of causal explanations, improving ease of use over earlier systems.

Contribution

It introduces a formalism for causal explanations translated into ASP, highlighting recent system improvements that enhance practicality and efficiency.

Findings

ASP translation is natural and efficient

Recent ASP system improvements facilitate formalism implementation

The approach improves practical usability of ASP for causal reasoning

Abstract

We examine the practicality for a user of using Answer Set Programming (ASP) for representing logical formalisms. Our example is a formalism aiming at capturing causal explanations from causal information. We show the naturalness and relative efficiency of this translation job. We are interested in the ease for writing an ASP program. Limitations of the earlier systems made that in practice, the ``declarative aspect'' was more theoretical than practical. We show how recent improvements in working ASP systems facilitate the translation.